Skoda Rally Blog

…. Having dismantled the first gearbox, I decided that there was too much to do to rebuild the Estate one, as I’d need some more specs than I have (i.e. any) and there’s a shim for the input shaft play that would need to be correct and I don’t have the shim or the sizes. So I managed to get a gearbox from an M-reg estate car, with a 90 day guarantee (although I think that it might not cover use in a rally car!), so that can be fitted at some point – it turned up bright and early this morning. However, there is work to be done before that. The original engine mountings have a lot of air gaps in them, so the engine can move about a fair bit. I got an “uprated” one from Chris Bennett, which replaces the mount with a Ford leaf-spring bush and uses an aluminium sleeve to reduce the size down to fit that. I think the gearbox needs that doing to it too, so I’m going to get one made for the end housing I’ve already removed and then put that on the new box. Finally, I’ll make up a new tie-bar (at the bottom of the engine) which controls how much the engine moves under accelerating and braking torque – again at present it’s about 50/50 air/rubber so that can be improved; I’ll make a new piece for that from some parts I have in the garage, and hopefully things should move around far less – at Fat Albert the gearlever was moving around a fair bit and making selection difficult, although the demise of 2nd might have had something to do with this…..

Otherwise, the rest of the car is looking OK. We’re looking to rally next on September 5th at Longcross (I heard a rumour that it might not be used after this year; I don’t know how much truth there is in that, but I would be kicking myself if I didn’t take the opportunity to rally there), and hopefully 26th at Caerwent, which apparently features over 100 turns per 7 mile stage. That should keep Kev busy! The kerbs there are supposed to be 11″ high, and if you go mental it’s a car wrecker, so a ‘slow’ pace for a finish would definitely be in order. Oh, that was what I was doing anyway. Well, sort of!

Well, just seen the final results, and in fact we came 52nd overall (although there were only 5 finishers behind us), and 8th in class. But importantly we beat a Ka rally car, and also number 17, which was a black Mk2 escort who really annoyed us on a couple of stages with his overtaking/harrying antics. He got 35 minutes of road penalties! Which is nice. There were big gaps ahead of us, so clearly we’re wasting our time trying to get any further up without a majorly faster engine. Which isn’t going to happen! The results for the rally are available here.

Wow, what a day that was. Total contrast to Smeatharpe in a number of ways.

First up, we drove to the rally from here, rather than getting a B&B. Unfortunately I’d mis-read the finals and got our scrutineering time wrong, until I read it at 6am and realised we needed to get there ASAP. Found it no problem at all, and got in the queue for scrutineering, which took a while, but we passed OK. Got to the service area and saw that we looked to be the only one not trailering and not having a big van for service. Got the wheels on, and were so late we missed the briefing and were in a bit of a hurry for stage one’s start. Got started OK, but found that this was a totally different proposition to the last rally, as there was a tight section which was over concrete paths which were only a car’s width, and there was no way to stay totally on them. Really felt it was bashing the car about, much more so than before. Stage two was a little hurried at the beginning, and we found the tyres were going off a bit towards the second lap, after the tight section; this was slowly addressed by bringing the tyre pressures down to 27 front and 22 rear hot, which got it sorted. However, much of the lap relied on being in second gear, which was quite grindy after the ‘new’ gearbox. On the upside, the car was topping 90 on the longer straights, and the brakes were really great.

On the later stages we got things more together, and improved times despite making a couple of excursions into the countryside on one stage when I got a bit OTT, and also really banging the front end hard by making a mess of the hairpin as we were being persued by a lapping car. Note to self: Sod everyone else, don’t look in the mirrors, and get on with your own race.

By stage 6, the car had started popping out of second in tight hairpins, so Kev took to holding it in gear, which worked pretty well; our times were good, and on this stage we nearly caught the car in front, a Lotus-Cortina, which was really good; we later had a chat with them and it turned out they had some issues with the front end (the struts were coming apart at the top) so they were taking it easy in the tight, bumpy section, but we were catching them on the rest of the lap too; the Fav really is excellent under braking, and handles well. On the next stage we were overtaken by a 2-litre Escort on the long straight, but saw that he was braking about twice the distance from the corner that we were, and we could still have braked harder; by the middle of the corner we were right behind him. If there’s a way to get more straight line speed out of the car without sacrificing reliability then the Fav really will be able to kick ass and take names!

Unfortunately the gear problem was getting worse, and during stage 8 it got much worse, and half way through stage nine we lost second completely, which is a real problem as the engine is not grunty enough to pull well in third (although it’s better with the lower final drive ratio; with the old box we would have been screwed completely). Stage 10 had to be done with no second gear at all, although it did have the advantage of showing us that a couple of the corners could be taken with wider lines in third! We got really harried in the tight section, and had to cane it in first, which the car really didn’t like; it started cutting out completely, and I thought it was all over as it stalled a couple of times. We got it going again, and finished the stage, but we’d lost 40 seconds compared to Stage 9 because of it. Final thing was when we got to the last control, the engine cut out, and wouldn’t go again. Lucky it didn’t happen 20 yards before! We got pushed through the service area, and Steve came to help, and we soon found that it was the distributor cap that had packed up and the arm was coming loose, and the oil filler cap was missing. Steve had a universal fuel filler cap which he gave me, and we bodged the distributor back together with some card, and it fired up straight away!

We checked the results, and it turned out that we only lost one place because of the loss of second gear, which wasn’t too disheartening; we’d come 7th in class (of 13) and 55th overall (of 85), which I reckon is really good; more to the point we’d done nearly 80 hard stage miles and had a bloody great time. But without second gear, the drive home was a little dodgy in places, and as it meant I couldn’t take part in the BDCC Slalom today, I went out instead, and went diving today. Now I just need to get the gearbox sorted so it’s reliable, and then we’ll be back. Everyone says that Caerwent is the next event to do, so we’ll have to get an entry for it!

Just seen the seeding for Fat Albert. I was expecting to be last. But we’re not! There are 4 cars behind us. One is a road rally Austin A40, so I’m not too worried about that, but then there’s a couple of class B cars, a Mazda 323 and a Mk.2 Escort, and a 1300 Nova. So we’ll see if we can manage to not get overtaken by them. I’m getting really excited about it now, and it’ll fly by as I have a very busy week ahead. Just got to put the sumpguard back on the car; everything else is ready to go….

…. so the gearbox goes in, and I drive down the road….. and the synchro on 2nd is screwed, just like the old box. Great. So (a) I need another box and (b) I need to get the money back from a a-hole who sold me it. I phoned him in a less than pleasant mood, and he said it was “OK when he broke the car”, er, no. And he said I should take the box out, and bring it back and he’d give me another one. Yeah, I’m going to drive another 220 miles because you’re a lazy twat. No, really. So I’m not sure how/if that will get sorted, but I am going to get it sorted. In the meantime, it could mean that Fat Albert will involve a retirement, as 2nd gear will be needed a lot.

On the plus side, the ‘box is from an Estate, and lower overall gearing, which means the car will really pull well in 3rd (75mph!) and pulls 4th out of the power. This should mean more top-end, which will be a good thing at Keevil as it’s another airfield. Everything else is set, and the stickers are on the car. So even if it won’t go, it’ll look better than before…..

… well, I’ve been left to change the gearbox on my own as Kev “forgot” that it needed doing, and has buggered off to Ireland with Tracie. At the moment I’ve managed to get the box out (which has actually been easier than I thought, mainly because most of the suspension, etc, has been on and off a couple of times already, so it’s not rusty or anything, and the gearbox is fairly light compared to, say, an Escort one), and I’ve got a new clutch to go in, just in case. I’ve given up for now as I was getting annoyed with it, and I’ve got all weekend to sort it out. I’ve never been a huge fan of being under a car that’s up on axle stands, and having to hammer the roll pin for the gearbox linkage out wasn’t something that I’d like to do for a pastime. But hey ho, it’s out now. Just got to remember how it all goes back together….

Got the results from Smeatharpe today, confirming our 43rd overall, and 2nd in class. And that our times were very s-l-o-w! Still, we finished!

With the results came some proofs of photos from the official photographer, which I’m pleased with as it looks like we were going fast at some point. I knew that we were making some kind of an effort….

There are some others – one of them we both look to be concentrating far too hard – very serious indeed…… So I’ll keep that to myself.

I worked out that John has done me enough “V”s to do two bonnets, so I stuck the rest on the car. It looks much better than it did – no longer just a plain old white Favorit, but a bit more jolly now. I’ve just got to finish off the nearside rear door, cutting the perspex and then putting our names on that side, and then we’re done. I may even put take some pictures of it later on.

Oh, and then I’ve got to change the gearbox. That’s a bit more of a job, and I’ll have to make up something to support the engine while the box comes out. I’m not exactly looking forward to changing it, as supporting the car will be hard – there’s nothing really to support it on, which is a bummer. Still, never mind…..

A while ago I met a guy on the Britishrally.co.uk forum who does vinyl graphics. He needs a website, I wanted some stickers, so we came to an arrangement. He sent them a couple of weeks ago, but they only turned up yesterday. So I set to making the car look a bit better. I know that at the end of the day it doesn’t matter one bit what it looks like, but I thought I’d make it look a bit nicer, so I went for the “works” look – the works favorits had green “V”s all over them, and I thought they looked good, and would also be simple to reproduce. So I’ve got a bunch of green Vs with red edges, and a nice new sunstrip (instead of the tank tape that was there before) with my work website URL on there, and driver and co-driver names for the rear doors…

… Ah, the rear doors. I wasn’t really happy with the lightweight ones I had fitted, ‘cos (a) they were the wrong shade of white (yes, I know, I know), and (b) I didn’t like the way the perspex windows fitted, just being screwed in, and looking tatty. So I cut the guts out of the original doors, and made the perspex fit into where the original windows did. It looks a lot better, although the perspex I’ve used is crap, ‘cos it scratches if you just look at it. Not good, especially at ?30 a go!

I can’t put all the stickers on though, ‘cos I’m going to replace the bonnet with a lightweight fibreglass one. Pity.

The throttle bodies arrived yesterday, and they’re going to be great. Biggest problem will be making a manifold though – that looks like a major undertaking, especially as the inlet tubes need to go from 35mm (throttle body) to 28mm (inlet port). That could be tricky. Answers on a postcard, please….

Last Tuesday, Steve phoned me and asked if I’d enter the Grass Autotest this Sunday. I said “yeah – why not?”. It obviously meant an early morning on the Sunday (and therefore not having a heavy night out on Saturday), but I thought I’d give it a stab. I then realised that the front struts were not quite right – the right one had sicked up all of its contents onto the suspension, and the left one was getting a bit weepy. To cut a long, painful story short, I ended up having to use seals that aren’t exactly right, and whoever had bodged the one before needs a clip round the ear! They’d over-tightened the strut cartridge top to try to make the seal work, which just meant I needed to buy special tools and sweat/swear a lot to get it open. Anyway, I fixed it on Saturday afternoon, which was good.

Sunday I went to find the fields we were in, and saw a variety of courses laid out, with maps and everything provided. It looked pretty complex, although walking the course did help a great deal, as did watching people go round while looking at the map and talking myself through the test. There were a total of 16 tests, and at the half-way point I was mid-way down my group, mainly due to getting a bit lost in one test and having to re-do one section to avoid a penalty. In the afternoon I made sure I didn’t do anything like that again, and had an absolute hoot, covering the car with mud and grass, and finding that it goes best if the engine is just stuck at 3000rpm and you do lots of handbrake turns! Even managed to do some left-foot braking on the practice course, although the back brakes are still a bit weak for that.

The results were posted, and I was amazed to find that I’d shot to first in class, seventh overall! I was best pleased! A cracking time was had for just ?15 for the day (plus jetwash costs, and also the fact that I managed to butcher the synchro on second gear during the course of the day, odd as I barely got out of first!), and I’m keen to do the next one on grass too….